Stephens, Joe

After graduating from Glenville State College in Glenville, a small town in rural West Virginia, in 1985, I taught for two years in the Ritchie County School system. When it became apparent that permanent full-time work in teaching was not going to be available anytime soon in or near my hometown of Parkersburg, WV, I went to seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. Before I could finish there, though, I moved back home and accepted a job as a youth minister at Emmanuel Baptist Church. I was on staff there, in various capacities, for six years before I realized how badly I missed the classroom and ap...